


Return

by Obvious Reactionary (Mysterious_Prophetess)



Series: Lab Rat [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen, Reunited and it feels so good., alien keith, some mentions of PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-08-25
Packaged: 2018-08-11 01:19:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7869931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysterious_Prophetess/pseuds/Obvious%20Reactionary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After weeks of searching, Keith had finally found what he was looking for: The Castle of Lions. Now he has to face the others with what he's become, and their reactions for better or worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Return

Five weeks, as best he could count them, had passed since Keith had escaped Galra Custody. Three weeks since he’d run into Twyla. He had no idea how much longer it was going to take for him to find the Castle of Lions, but he needed to do so sooner rather than later.

————————————————————————— ——— —————

Keith was on some planet the Galra had conquered and thanks to the clothing his— that _Twyla_ had given him, he was able to hide Red beyond the outskirts of the town and walk right in without anyone giving him too many strange looks.

“Cub, where are your parents?” Keith looked to see it was a large lizard-like Galra woman asking him this.

“Leave off him Girra! Just because your cub is off at the academy doesn’t mean you need to mother every younger cub you see,” Another lizard like Galra said. his ears seemed to be shorter than the identified Girra’s and his skin not quite as purple as the average Galran.

“No one asked you, half-breed!” Girra sneered. Keith had used this argument to slip away.

—————— ——————————————— ———————————

He finished buying supplies for “his parents” whenever Girra caught up to him with a few armored Galra soldiers with her.

“Can I help you?” Keith said politely.

“Are your parents aware that we have recently instated a planet wide edict that no minors are to be left to wander alone?” A Galran officer said next to her. Though he was covered in armor, Keith could see ears like Sendak’s sticking out the side slits.

“No,” Keith said, “Why?”

“Enemies of the Empire have been spotted in the system.” Keith mentally cursed. They’d seen his lion.

“I’ll just get back to the ship then,” Keith said.

“We’ll escort you,” the officer said. Keith shook his head and drew his dagger, the Crest mark carefully covered as it was before everything had happened to him.

“I don’t need protecting,” he said, his ears flattened.

“Cub has some fangs after all. Very well, get back to your parents, and we don’t want to see you unescorted until we can confirm those Altean Terrorists are gone,” the officer said. Keith barely stopped his face from reacting but he did and nodded.

—————— ———————————

Keith was half way to Red whenever he realized he’d forgotten what he’d purchased but if he went back now, they’d continue to harass him. “Altean Terrorists” had to mean the Castle Ship had been spotted or at least another Lion. He got into Red and was in space as soon as it was possible. He flipped the comm channels on and heard a static-y voice that was very familiar.

“Keith? Are you there?”

“Coran!” Keith said into the set. The Video feed was broken, Keith hadn’t been able to repair it while on the run.

“Thank the stars! We finally were able to lock onto your signal,” Coran’s voice said.

“I’m heading right for you,” Keith said, “Did you find the others?”

“We did. Shiro was touch and go for a while but he’s stabilized. The others were a bit banged up but otherwise ok,” Coran said.

“Hey, I thought the Red lion was supposed to be the fastest!” Keith felt his ears drop,

“Space is vast, idiot,” he said flatly.

“Keith, is your video feed broken?” that was Pidge.

“Yeah,” Keith said.

“How did you manage to survive eight weeks without repairing that?” Hunk was speaking.

“Eight weeks?” Keith said. That means that Druid had him for three.

“That’s how long it’s been,” that was Shiro. Keith was relieved to hear he was ok, but hearing him speak was an even bigger relief.

“Where were you?” that was Allura.

“Running from the Galra,” Keith said.

——————————————— ———————————————

_The control room of the Castle Ship had all the humanoid residents, except one, gathered around the communications console and there was no image just static._

_“I’m almost to the Castle,” Keith said, and according to the display, he was._

_“We’ll meet you down in the hanger bays,” Allura said._

_“Alright. Keith, out.”_

_“He sounded ok, and not mind controlled,” Hunk said. Everyone else looked at him.“What?”_

_“If Keith had been captured by the Galra at all, there probably would have been a huge deal made out of it,” Shiro said, “Capturing a Paladin of Voltron would have been a huge victory for the Galra Empire.”_

_“Unless they were plotting something. Keith seemed surprised it had been Eight Weeks as your humans count it,” Coran said._

_“It’s possible wherever the Red Lion crashed initially, Keith was knocked unconscious for a few days and that threw off his count,” Pidge said._

_“Or, he’s just really bad at time keeping,” Lance said._

——————————————— ————————————— —————

Keith landed Red in the hanger gently before he moved to exit the Lion, but a reflection of a purple face on his helmet made him stop cold. He’d gotten so used to being…like _that_ that he’d forgotten it had even been done to him. Thinking fast, he pulled his armor back on and the helmet, carefully taking his ears into consideration and most of him was covered. The lower half of his face was still somewhat exposed but it would keep most of him covered.

He exited Red only to be tackle-glomped by the others, including Allura and Coran. Pidge had jumped and hugged him around the neck, and their head was mostly covering up his face. He felt safe, for the first time in weeks, but was was scared about how the others would react once they realized he’d been changed.

“Keith, did you not have any way to shave or something?” Pidge asked him. Keith knew they’d feel the fur.

“Keith with a beard? This I’ve got to see,” Shiro said as he let go. The others let go and Keithsighed before he helped Pidge step down.

“I’ve only been running for five weeks,” Keith said as he grabbed hold of his helmet.

“What happened the other three?” Allura asked.

“I was a prisoner,” Keith said pulling the helmet off his head, he could feel his ears twitching at the freedom, “A Druid decided it’d be fun to do _this_.” He closed his eyes bracing for the yelps of disgust. Shiro’s gasp forced Keith to open his eyes. Shiro was pale and trembling.

“They tried doing that to another prisoner when they-,” Shiro stopped and shook his head, left hand gripping his right arm, “The prisoner died.” Allura had her hands over her mouth and everyone else was mostly pale, or as pale as they could go in Hunk and Lance’s cases, and just staring at Keith. He looked away, he had never felt more like a science experiment than that moment.

“Do you know why they did this?” Coran asked getting closer to Keith.

“I’m not sure, maybe because they could,” Keith said with a shrug, “A rebel Galra freed me and destroyed the ship I was on. After that I was one the run. I ran into two other Galra rebels. There is a Resistance, but the one rebel told me that it wasn’t well organized because some Druids can read minds.”

 

“Are you feeling ok?” Keith looked back up to see it was Allura who had also joined Coran in checking Keith over.

“I’m ok,” Keith said, “I think.” Shiro walked closer to Keith and he flinched, his ears drooping. He was shocked whenever his foster brother hugged him. Keith did not expect Shiro to hug him, not with his PTSD. Not with Keith now being one of his triggers.

“You’re going to be ok,” Shiro said.

“But are you?” Keith said, “I found out something else from the second Rebel I met after I escaped,” Keith said as he steppedof the hug and then carefully pulled his dagger off his belt, sheath and all. He held it out for Allura to take.

“Take the wraps off the blade,” Keith said quietly. Allura did so and gasped.

“What is that?” Lance asked.

“This is Zarkon’s personal family crest,” Allura said, “How did you get this?”

“My mother gave it to me. Her father gave it to her,” Keith said.

“Your mother?” Hunk said.

“The second Rebel Galra,” Keith said, “I was always Half-Galra and didn’t know it. She wanted it that way.”

“Your mother is of the House of Zarkon,” Coran said. Keith nodded.

“How closely related?” That was Allura.

“She’s one of his daughters.” Keith was waiting for the others to tell him to get lost. What he heard instead was someone laughing.

It was Lance. Everyone was staring at _him_ now.

“Are you ok?” Hunk asked Lance.

“Of course! If anyone’s not ok, it’s Shiro and Keith. Keith’s the Spawn of the Spawn of literal Space Satan!” Lance saidas he laughed some more. It turned out to be contagious and soon everyone was laughing.

————————————————— ———————————

Keith was in the medbay alone with Coran and Allura,

“According to the pod, you’re perfectly healthy for a Galra your age,” Coran said, “And it’s probably because you were already half-Galra that you survived whereas that other poor fellow Shiro mentioned didn’t. Your DNA is also stable, so you won’t spontaneously return to being half-Galra. I’m afraid and we cannot reverse the process that Druid used.”

“I had already thought this was permanent,” Keith said as he fought back a yawn.

“Why don’t you rest up now?” Allura said. The Red Paladin nodded before he exited the medbay. The Alteans exchanged looks and waited until they were sure Keith was out of Galra hearing range, especially with all the ambient noise on a space ship.

“How do you _really_ feel about this, Coran?” Allura said.

“The scans showed no Druid tampering in his brain so he’s not their puppet and there are no implants either, so he’s also not being tracked. It’s disconcerting to look at him and see a Galra but he’s still Keith,” Coran said.

“He was half-Galra before he was changed and served as a Paladin with no problems, but I can’t help but feel that his connection to Zarkon’s personal family could spell trouble for us down the line,” Allura said, “I trust Keith, but Galra are fiercely possessive of family.”

—————————— ————————————————— —————

The rest of the Paladins were in the common area.

“So, Keith’s a Galra now and everyone’s ok with this?” Lance said.

“It’s not ideal, but Keith didn’t choose to have this done to him anymore than Shiro chose to have that arm,” Pidge said as they worked on something on their laptop.

“I stand by what I said earlier. He doesn’t seem to be brainwashed.” Hunk was working on some gadget because Pidge had asked him to fix it.

“I’ve known Keith the longest of any of us,” Shiro said, “It’s not going to be easy but I still trust him.”

“What about you?” Hunk said gesturing with a screw driver at Lance.

“Pink or Purple. Mullet or not, Keith’s still my rival!” Lance said in an overly dramatic pose.

“Glad to see you care.” Lance jumped with a yelp at Keith’s sudden appearance. Shiro flinched and the others didn’t react.

“Seriously, though, that’s the weirdest part about this whole thing: They destroyed the mullet!” Lance said, acting as if he hadn’t yelped like a little girl. Hunk looked up.

 

“Can I—.”

“No. You’re not petting the ears,” Keith said flattening them. Hunk deflated a little before he and Pidge shared an evil look. The Yellow and Green paladins tackled the Red one to the ground and fought off the clawed swipes to touch the fluffy appendages.

“So, soft!” Pidge said.

“Just like petting a fluffy cat!” Hunk said. Lance joined them with a giggle that made Keith growl a little.

“Guys, get off!” Keith said trying to push them off, gently. He also didn’t want to admit that felt nice. Shiro laughed and managed to pull Hunk and Lance off Keith and Pidge was gently shoved off a second later. Shiro offered Keith his flesh hand and he took it to get hauled to his feet only for Shiro to scratch one of the ears.

“Shir-o!” Keith complained.

“They’re right, it is like petting a fluffy cat,” Shiro said. For the first time since Keith had arrived that day, Shiro wasn’t fighting off a flash back. The situation would get better in time. Someday.

 

———————————————————————————————— —————————————

**Author's Note:**

> What's this? Two postings in two days?
> 
> I felt like being nice and post this now instead of waiting a week.
> 
> Of course I also start classes on Monday....
> 
> Enjoy!


End file.
